It appears that there are lots of "Ubuntu alongside Windows" posts, but I couldn't find my answer.

My PC's only OS was Windows 7 x64. All of my 750 GB HDD partitions were in NTFS format. Yesterday I made 15 GB of unallocated space to install Ubuntu 11.10 x64. During the installation (installed from USB) I chose "Install Ubuntu alongside Windows 7" option. After that everything goes smooth and installation was successfully completed. Ubuntu asked me to remove the installation media and restart the computer.

After restarting the PC, Windows 7 was loaded. I was expecting an OS selection menu. It appears that Ubuntu didn't change master boot record at all.

Using EASEUS Partition Master Home Edition, I found that Ubuntu made 2 partitions in that 15 GB unallocated spaces (11 GB + 4 GB). So I can assume that Ubuntu did get installed where I wanted it to be installed. But I can't boot to Ubuntu. How can I fix this? I want to have an OS selection menu.

I'm an advanced user of Windows but extremely new in Linux. Please provide enough details so a new user like me understand the process.

P.S. I don't want to use Boot Repair as it isn't officially supported by Canonical.

Just to make sure, did you press like crazy ESC or leave it pressed while booting. Just in case the booting part of Linux (GRUB) was not appearing. Normally this would send you to a booting menu. Just to be sure about this.
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Luis Alvarado♦Feb 17 '12 at 5:52

When booting press it or leave it pressed. If the system has GRUB in 0 seconds then you will never see the menu unless you press ESC or leave SHIFT pressed I think. Try both just in case. If it works you should see the menu, if not then you might need to reinstall grub which should be enough.
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Luis Alvarado♦Feb 17 '12 at 5:59

2 Answers
2

This question has come up in past threads on this site. Below is a link to help resolve your problem. It requires booting from an Ubuntu live cd to be able to re-install GRUB in the master boot record. Process is explained in detail

One nuance to be careful about - the instructions say to check if you have a separate boot partition, and if so then do sudo mount /dev/sd·· /mnt/boot. I got confused here - I did have a boot partition that was not my Linux, it was my base partition (/sda0). So I did that command, and ended up getting a grub menu that only showed my Windows boot. I re-ran the procedure without the doing the sudo mount /dev/sd·· /mnt/boot and it worked beautifully. The instructions are only referring to a separate Linux boot partition, not for the case where your boot partition is not Linux.